Me and Charlie Talking
by Queen of My Own Little World
Summary: Much of Claire's story has been left out. Here’s my version of how it went, filling in the blanks- particularly those parts involving Charlie. This story is partially inspired by Miranda Lambert’s song of the same name


Me And Charlie Talking

Intro: Claire has always been my favorite character. Much of her story has been left out. Here's my version of how it went, filling in the blanks- particularly those parts involving Charlie. This story is partially inspired by Miranda Lambert's song of the same name.

None of this belongs to me. All that is written here is merely my own work and not authorized by Lindeloff, Cuse of ABC.

* * *

_In The Beginning_

_"So we treat our love like a firefly_  
_Like it only gets to shine for a little while_  
_Catch it in a mason jar_  
_With holes in the top_  
_And run like hell to show it off_  
_Oh promises we made when we'd go walkin_  
_That's just me and Charlie talking"_

_ -Miranda Lambert "Me and Charlie Talking"_

* * *

Claire sat by the fire, watching it without truly seeing it at all. The flames flickered but her eyes were seeing something else. What she saw reminded her of an old video tape, like the ones her mother used to take when Claire was little, recording all of Claire's biggest moments. Those videos were still stored on a shelf in Claire's apartment; when she moved out of her childhood home she had been unable to leave them.

"Why are you taking those?" Aunt Lindsey had asked when she saw Claire packing them into one of the few cardboard boxes she was taking with her.

"I don't know," Claire had responded. That was a lie.

"Those are rubbish, Claire," Lindsey had said dismissively, "They won't bring her back."

That too was a lie. Claire knew very well that physically her mother would never come back to her. But when she held those videos it almost felt as though her mother was back with her again, hovering over her, protecting her.

_Stop that_, Claire had scolded herself internally, _Mom's not a ghost. She's not dead. She **will** come back. She has to. She would never leave me._

Claire had simply shrugged and continued to pack away her memories. Lindsey had shaken her head and walked away. Lindsey wasn't like Claire. Lindsey wanted to forget Carole, she wanted to move on. But Claire couldn't. She didn't dare forget. It had been two years at that point, Claire knew in the back of her mind that it was over. Carole had stopped fighting. There had been no change in her condition for two bloody years. Claire knew this; she was neither stupid nor naïve.

On the contrary Claire was a smart girl, she had always done well at school and science had been her best subject. From a young age she dreamed of becoming a doctor. In some foggy and grey part of her mind, stuffed and hidden in the back, she had a recollection of a man telling her that she was his little genius; he had told her that she'd make a great doctor someday.

Had that been her father? Her memories were too misty to know for sure. But it must have been. She had grown up listening to stories about her father, her father the brilliant surgeon; these tales had been like bedtime stories for a young Claire, told lovingly and wistfully by Carole. Sometimes Carole had cried when telling them.

But now Claire knew the truth. Those stories were just that- stories, fairy tales. They, like so many parts of her life, were lies. Her father had not been a good man. He had abandoned her. She had grown up in a house of cards. And that house of cards had tumbled down two years ago, when her life had literally careened out of her control.

And now, at nineteen, Claire was alone again, packing up the last of her mother, compartmentalizing her memories. She lovingly stroked the last of the videos as she packed it away.

For two years those video cassettes had been hidden in a cupboard in the tiny studio apartment she had shared with Tom, the supposed love of her life. She never took them out, but at times she had opened the cupboard door and stared at them, trying to remember the happy parts of her life eternally contained in them.

Even if she had wanted to she wouldn't have been able to watch them. They didn't even own a VCR. Claire and Tom lived what he had called and "artist's life." That was just his idealized way of saying they were poor. But Tom had always been an idealist. It had been that sunny optimism that had drawn Claire to him in the first place. That and his seemingly intrinsic way of seeing her in a way no one else ever had before.

She remembered the first time she had met Tom. It was in the crowded food court in the mall. She had sullenly been picking at her French fries; ever since the car accident she had completely lost her appetite.

Tom had approached her, orange cafeteria tray in hand.

"Mind if I sit?" He had asked. He had a self-assured smile. _Cocky_,Claire thought. She shrugged and continued to pick at her chips. He sat down across from her.

"I'm Tom," He had said, holding out his hand.

"Claire," She told him, shaking his hand briefly.

"So Claire, what brings you to this fine establishment today?" He had asked. Claire resisted the urge to cringe. Why couldn't he just shut up? Didn't he see she just wanted to be alone? She glanced around the food court; there were more than a few empty tables. Damn it, he wanted to talk to her. She guessed that he wouldn't leave her alone until he had succeeded in drawing her into a conversation.

"I work here," Claire said curtly. She wanted to keep her answers short, maybe if she didn't encourage him he'd go away.

"Really, where?" He asked. He seemed genuinely interested. She couldn't remember the last time a guy had been interested in her.

"Everlasting Art," Claire told him. He looked confused, "It's a tattoo parlor."

"Ah, so you're one of those girls." Tom said smugly.

"One of what girls?" She shot back defensively.

"I'm guessing you are one of those girls who pretend to be dark."

"I am not pretending anything."

"Yes you are," He said knowingly, "Believe me. You aren't dark at all."

Claire said nothing, staring at him in disbelief. How dare he? He didn't know her at all.

"Why do you did you dye it black?" He asked her seemingly out of the blue, nodding to her hair. Claire instinctively touched her the dry and brittle strands.

"I don't know," She answered truthfully, "I guess I wanted a change."

"It doesn't suit you. You'd be much better as a blonde."

"And who are you that you get to say that?" Claire shot at him.

"I'm an artist." He said simply "I see things as they are, not as how people think they are. You think you're dark. But you aren't. I can tell. You are a good person; you and I both know it. But you seem to have forgotten that."

Claire didn't say anything for a few long moments. She turned his words over in her mind. Could he possibly be right? No, that couldn't be. He was a stranger; he didn't know her from any other girl. He was wrong. He had to be.

"I haven't forgotten anything." Claire said. But her voice was soft; she wasn't sure anymore.

"Believe me," He said again. That was infuriating. Why should she believe him? She didn't know him, and he didn't know her. She didn't even know if she believed in anything anymore.

"Tell you what," Tom said with a broad smile, "lemme take you out tonight. I'll show you what life is like on the light side."

Claire wanted to refuse, but before she could stop herself she was nodding in agreement.

"Let me pick you up after work. What time do you get off?"

"Six," She told him. Why was she doing this? But she let him take her out that night. He had taken her out to a nice restaurant, assuring her that her jeans and tee-shirt were fine there. The looks she had gotten from the wait staff and other patrons seemed to say otherwise.

The rest of their romance had gone quickly. Before she knew it she started to believe his claims that she wasn't dark. She died her hair back to blonde, a change that had pleased Aunt Lindsey immensely. Tom's glass-half-full attitude started to rub off on her. He introduced her to his friends, all artists like him. They had introduced her to spirituality- or as Aunt Lindsey called it "a phase of hippie nonsense."

As she and Tom drew closer she became completely immersed in their relationship. Soon her old friends, other self-proclaimed Dark People, started to annoy her. She drifted away from them until her old life was completely abandoned and forgotten. Six months after meeting Tom she accepted his proposal to move in with him. This was it, she had thought. This was love. She had found her soul mate. She was going to get her happily ever after.

Until Claire and Tom had broken up they only had two sources of disagreement.

The first was about her visits to her mother. Tom didn't like that she visited Carole nearly every day. Actually, it wasn't that he disliked it; he just didn't understand it. He tried to get her to stop. He told her that visiting Carole was just causing her pain. She needed to move on, he said. And apparently she couldn't do that if she kept dwelling. That's what he had called her visits- dwelling.

After far too many fights Claire unconsciously curbed her hospital visits to twice a week, then once a week, once every two weeks, once a month. Soon she had nearly stopped visiting all together. Tom won that argument. But she had won the other.

She refused to give up the video tapes. Tom had tried to persuade her to dump them more times than she cared to count. He told her they were just bringing her down, making her dwell. There was that word again. What did it even mean? Wasn't it just a fancy way to say remember? And what was so wrong with remembering?

He had begged and bargained, pleaded and yelled about those tapes. He said he needed the room for his paint supplies. So she packed the tapes into a box and put them under the bed. He accused her of caring more about the tapes then her relationship with him. Those accusations often made her cry. He seemed to be okay with that; he took her tears to mean that she knew he was right and would acquiesce to his demands soon.

But then she had gotten pregnant. He had told her they could start a family, it'd be the greatest thing ever. Her happily ever after was finally within reach. She also had a new reason to keep the tapes. She told Tom that she wanted to keep them to show to the baby, so the baby could see his or her grandmother when she was awake.

Tom hated that term: awake. He told her Carole wasn't asleep, she was gone. Her heart might still be beating but as far as he was concerned Carole was dead. He wanted her to give up what he called delusions. Carole wasn't going to wake up, not now, not ever.

But secretly Claire thought that maybe the birth of her child would somehow send a trigger through the cosmos and wake Carole up. Claire firmly believed, contrary to what Tom thought, that a part of Carole was still there. Carole would know when the baby was born; she'd know that the baby would want his grandmother. She also had to know that Claire needed her mother now. Claire didn't know how to be a mother. Aunt Lindsey had mostly disowned Claire. Not that she knew anything about childrearing anyway. The two years Claire had lived with Lindsey after the accident had certainly proved that.

And apparently Tom too felt ill-equipped to raise a child. He decided he didn't even want to try. So he ran away. So much for optimism.

After Tom left Claire was ruined. Her so-called new friends abandoned her too. She guessed that they were more loyal to Tom, their fellow artist, than to Claire, the lowly waitress with dreams of domesticity. She lay in bed for a full week, calling out of work and dwelling, just like Tom probably knew she would. She had lost all hope of being a mother. She decided to give it up. She would travel over seven thousand miles to avoid having to take on this responsibility by herself.

And now Claire was here. Another accident had befallen her. This time it was in the form of a plane crash. The situation was so ludicrous Claire would have laughed if she wasn't so terrified.

God, how long would Claire be on this island? She was due on October 27th, her birthday. The universe must really have it out for her. It was September 22nd, possibly 23rd; she had no watch and no way of knowing if it was past midnight. She calculated quickly in her head. Five weeks, she had five weeks left.

Would they find her in time? Judging by Claire's recent string of luck she somehow doubted it.

_Dear God,_ she prayed silently. She couldn't remember the last time she'd prayed. Carole had never been big on religion; she had preferred to celebrate the holidays in what she called "The Holy Church of The Blessed Littleton Family." Meaning the tiny little house they lived in. Carole never went to church, although Claire's grandparents had been religious before they died shortly before Carole's accident. They had argued fiercely when Carole chose not to baptize Claire. But at this moment Claire was compelled by some unknown force inside her to seek comfort in a force she wasn't even sure existed.

_Dear God,_ Claire pleaded;_ Don't make me go through this. Please, give me some help with this. I can't have this baby here, I can't do this. Don't make me do this alone. _

"Hiya," A voice said from above her, "do you want a blanket?"

Claire raised her head. She had almost forgotten that there were other people here. She felt so utterly alone that she almost believed she was the only one going through this. A man was staring at her. He was short and blonde with a distinctively British accent. He was smiling warmly at her. No one had smiled at her like that since Tom had left. She couldn't remember who this man was; all the survivor's faces had blurred together in a few hours of terror. But she liked his smile.

"Oh thanks, but I got one," She told him, gesturing to the thin, scratchy airplane blanket draped ineffectually across her legs.

"Well, you're warming for two, take mine." He said with the slightest hint of pleading in his voice. For the first time since she had crashed she felt like someone wasn't afraid of her. He seemed to like her. Instead of avoiding her it was almost like he wanted to care for her, as ridiculous as that was. He was a perfect stranger.

But a tiny smile forced itself across her lips along with a breath of what was almost laughter. He was funny. When was the last time someone had joked with her? Sure, she knew what he said was patently wrong. She may not know that much about pregnancy, she had bought several books on the subject and even though most of them had never had even had their spines cracked she was almost positive that that wasn't how it worked.

"Thank you," She said, genuinely grateful. The man handed the blanket to her, hesitated for a moment and then sat down next to her by the fire. He rubbed his hands together in front of the fire. She pulled the second blanket over her torso. It wasn't much, but it did help a little. He seemed to visibly relax.

"So," He said amicably, a real smile crossing his face, "First plane crash?"

"What gave it away?" Claire instinctively responded, her old sarcastic nature seeming to awaken from deep inside her. She rolled her eyes, pretending to be annoyed but relishing in this simple friendly exchange.

The man looked up at the starlit sky before answering, "Ah, you can always spot the newbies," He joked.

Another laugh escaped Claire, this time realer and much more definite. She looked down, almost ashamed at the comfort and warmth this man seemed to invoke inside her. He laughed at her laughter, his smile broadening.

Then he looked down again, gazed at the fire. His smile faded, his demeanor shifted. He seemed to realize exactly where he was, realize that this was not flirting with some girl in a bar. And that she was not at all the type of girl who he would flirt with in such a bar.

"We're going to be okay, you know," He assured her. We, he said. He seemed to acknowledge that they were in this together. She didn't even know his name but she felt comforted by him. She was a stranger to him, but he spoke to her like an old friend. Claire's smile slowly faded and she bit her lip, not able to trust him, not able to believe him. She had heard so many empty promises in her life. The last thing she needed right now was more false hope.

"Are we?" She asked doubtfully. She looked at him for reassurance, like he knew what to do, what would happen.

"We're alive," He told her. He didn't seem to be making any statement of fact; it was more like he was reminding her of this crucial piece of information. He looked her straight in the eyes as he said this, begging her to understand what he was saying. When he continued his voice was hopeful and confident.

"We're on a beautiful island." He said, gazing around the beach. Claire's eyes followed his. The scene was sorta lovely. The jungle was lush, the sand white, the ocean a sparkling clear blue. But the entire landscape was corrupted by the broken pieces of the plane scattered around them. The largest part, the fuselage, was stretched towards the sky, an eerie skeleton looming over paradise. Claire suddenly felt like she was going to cry.

"We'll sleep under the stars and before you know it, the helicopters will come and take us all home." He shrugged as he said this, as though this scenario was not a guess but a guaranteed fact, like it was all fated. But Claire had lived through too much heartbreak to believe in providence. She looked once again at the fire before turning once again to him.

"You really think they'll find us?" She asked doubtfully. She wanted him to reassure her, she felt like if he confirmed this she'd believe him. He looked at her disbelievingly, blinking in astonishment. His forehead crinkled in confusion.

"Yeah, why wouldn't they?" He asked. Clearly this man had lived a much more fortunate life than Claire. Or maybe not, after all he too had crashed on this island.

She mulled this over quietly for a second before realizing that he was probably right. Theirs was not the first plane to ever crash. And didn't planes today have that thing, what were they called? Black boxes? Maybe he was right. She smiled slightly.

"Thanks," She said. She meant it, too. He would possibly never know what those simple words meant to her. But they were perhaps the most meaningful words she had ever heard. He simply nodded, smilingly again, embarrassed this time. He stuck his tongue out slightly, like he was trying to work up the nerve for something drastic and brave.

"I'm Charlie," He said, holding out his hand to her. She suddenly remembered yet again that he was not a trusted friend, but a stranger. But maybe he could one day be more.

"Claire," She said, taking his hand gratefully. She smiled, "Nice to meet you, Charlie," She said, as though this was in fact a simple exchange between a man and a woman in some bar.

"Nice to meet you," He told her. And somehow she knew that he really meant it. She smiled widely, forcing herself to look away but unable to stop herself from sneaking another peak at him. He smiled back at her.

* * *

A/N: Yeah, slow start, I know. Think of this more as a prologue than a first chapter. After this I'm fast-forwarding to season three.


End file.
